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Betty Dodson

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Betty Dodson
Dodson in 2010
Born(1929-08-24)August 24, 1929
Wichita, Kansas,U.S.
DiedOctober 31, 2020(2020-10-31)(aged 91)
New York City,U.S.
Known forSex-positive feminism

Betty Dodson(August 24, 1929 – October 31, 2020) was an Americansex educator.An artist by training, she exhibitederotic artinNew York City,before pioneering thepro-sex feministmovement. Dodson's workshops and manuals encourage women tomasturbate,often in groups.

Early career[edit]

Dodson went to New York City to train as an artist in 1950, and lived onManhattan'sMadison Avenuefrom 1962.[1]In 1959, Dodson married Frederick Lief, an advertising director; they divorced in 1965.[1]Dodson's quest for "sexual self-discovery" began after her divorce.[1]Dodson held a first one-woman show of erotic art at the Wickersham Gallery in New York City in 1968.[2]In 1987, herMs.magazinememoirand instructional series,Sex for One,was published.Random Houselater published the work broadly, and it was translated into 25 languages.[3]

Dodson criticizedEve Ensler'sThe Vagina Monologues,which she believed has a negative and restrictive view of sexuality with ananti-malebias.[4]

Dodson earned a degree from theunaccreditedInstitute for the Advanced Study of Human Sexualityfor her research work on sexuality.[5]

Workshops and coaching[edit]

Carlin Ross

Dodson became active in thesex-positive movementin the late 1960s.[6]

From the 1970s onwards, she organisedBodysex workshops.Bodysex is a practice developed by Betty Dodson to help women connect with their bodies anderogenous zones,healshames,improvepleasureperception, and promoteself-love.In the workshops, women were guided to explore their bodies and masturbate together to learn, with guidance,howto have anorgasmas a woman alone and with asexual partner.[7]Her two-hour sessions featured 15 naked women, each using aHitachi Magic Wandto aid in masturbation.[8]Dodson used the Magic Wand, a main-poweredvibrator,in demonstrations and instructional classes to instruct women regarding self-pleasure techniques.[9][10]She provided a Magic Wand to each woman for these sessions.[11]She recommended women put a small towel over theirvulvain order to dull the sensation of the vibrator and prolong the pleasurable experience.[12]The essence of her method was to provide vaginal and clitoral stimulation at the same time.[13]Dodson taught thousands of women to achieveorgasmusing this technique.[8]Her technique became known as the Betty Dodson Method.[14]

She worked for many years with the lawyer Carlin Ross as a business partner, and the two women held their workshops mostly together.

A study conducted in 2007 tested the "Betty Dodson Method" in group therapy with 500 previously anorgasmic women. Of the 500, 465 (93%) had orgasms during therapy, 35 (7%) did not.[15]In a 2021 study, the female techniques for pleasurablevaginal intercoursetaught by Dodson ( "Angling, Rocking, Shallowing, Pairing" ) are again described by women.[16]

Later career[edit]

Dodson published a memoir,Sex by Design,in 2010.[1]

In 2014, she stated that she considered herself afourth-wave feminist,stating that the previous waves of feminist were banal and anti-sexual, which is why she has chosen to look at a new stance of feminism, fourth wave feminism. In 2014, Dodson worked with women to discover their sexual desires through masturbation. Dodson said her work has gained a support from an audience of young, successful women who have never had an orgasm. This includes fourth-wave feminists – those rejecting the anti-pleasure stance they believethird-wave feministsstand for.[17]

Dodson died on October 31, 2020, at the age of 91, fromcirrhosisin a Manhattannursing home.[18][3]

Bibliography[edit]

  • Dodson, Betty (1978).Liberating Masturbation: A Meditation on Self Love.Dodson.
  • Dodson, Betty (1996).Sex for One: The Joy of Selfloving.New York: Crown Trade Paperbacks.ISBN0-517-88607-3.OCLC15696491.
  • Dodson, Betty (2003).Orgasms for Two: The Joy of Partnersex.Potter/Ten Speed/Harmony/Rodale.ISBN978-1-4000-5203-5.
  • Dodson, Betty (2013).Learn to Orgasm in 4 Acts.Betty A Dodson Foundation Incorporated.ISBN978-0-578-12140-6.
  • Dodson, Betty (2016).Sex by Design: The Betty Dodson Story.CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform.ISBN978-1-5308-3412-9.

By others[edit]

References[edit]

  1. ^abcdTheobold, Stephanie (May 5, 2014)."Masturbation: the secret to a long life?".The Guardian.Archivedfrom the original on March 18, 2015.RetrievedMarch 7,2015.
  2. ^Allyn, David (May 23, 2016).Make Love, Not War: The Sexual Revolution: An Unfettered History.Routledge.p. 141.ISBN978-1-134-93473-7.
  3. ^abGreen, Penelope (November 3, 2020)."Betty Dodson, Women's Guru of Self-Pleasure, Dies at 91".The New York Times.ISSN0362-4331.RetrievedNovember 4,2020.
  4. ^Grant, Melissa Gira (December 16, 2013)."Betty Dodson's Feminist Sex Wars".Truthout.Archivedfrom the original on March 22, 2020.RetrievedMarch 22,2020.
  5. ^"Betty Dodson author biography".randomhouse.Random House.Archivedfrom the original on March 30, 2013.RetrievedApril 8,2012.
  6. ^Love, Barbara J.(2006), "Dodson, Betty Ann", inLove, Barbara J.(ed.),Feminists who changed America, 1963–1975,Urbana, Illinois:University of Illinois Press,pp.120–121,ISBN9780252031892
  7. ^Carlin Ross, Betty Dodson:Betty Dodson Bodysex Basics.Betty Dodson Foundation, 24 February 2017. ISBN 978-0578190723.
  8. ^abWinks, Cathy; Semans, Anne (1997), "Profiles in pleasure: Betty Dodson| Vibrators and partners ", in Winks, Cathy; Semans, Anne (eds.),The New Good Vibrations Fuide to Sex,Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania:Cleis Press,pp. 102, 154,ISBN9781573440691
  9. ^Trout, Christopher (August 27, 2014)."The 46-year-old sex toy Hitachi won't talk about".Engadget.Archived fromthe originalon August 27, 2014.RetrievedAugust 30,2014.
  10. ^Westheimer, Ruth K.(2007). "Savouring solo play and fantasy". InWestheimer, Ruth K.(ed.).Sex for Dummies.Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley. pp. 204–206.ISBN9780470045237.
  11. ^Dodson, Betty (1996). "Making love alone". In Dodson, Betty (ed.).Sex for one: the joy of selfloving.New York: Crown Trade Paperbacks. p. 154.ISBN9780517886076.
  12. ^Kemp, K. M. (June 2003)."25 ways to have your best orgasm ever!".Marie Claire.Vol. 10, no. 6. p. 233.Archivedfrom the original on February 18, 2017.RetrievedFebruary 18,2017– viaInfoTrac.
  13. ^Dodson, Betty (2003).Orgasms for Two: The Joy of Partnersex.Potter/Ten Speed/Harmony/Rodale.ISBN978-1-4000-5203-5.
  14. ^Struck, Pia; Ventegodt, Søren (2008)."Clinical holistic medicine: teaching orgasm for females with chronic anorgasmia using the Betty Dodson Method".The Scientific World Journal.8:883–895.doi:10.1100/tsw.2008.116.PMC5848654.PMID18836654.
  15. ^Hatim A. Omar, Pia Struck, Søren Ventegodt: "Clinical Holistic Medicine: Teaching Orgasm for Females with Chronic Anorgasmia using the Betty Dodson Method".The Scientific World Journal,Volume 8, 27 August 2008.
  16. ^Devon J. Hensel, Christiana D. von Hippel, Charles C. Lapage, Robert H. Perkins: "Women's techniques for making vaginal penetration more pleasurable: results from a nationally representative study of adult women in the United States".PLOS ONE,14 April 2021.
  17. ^Smith, Lydia (May 7, 2014)."Betty Dodson and fourth-wave feminism: masturbation is key to longer life".International Business Times.Archivedfrom the original on May 11, 2014.RetrievedMay 12,2014.
  18. ^"Orgasme-pioner død".Ekstra Bladet(in Danish).Archivedfrom the original on November 2, 2020.RetrievedNovember 2,2020.

External links[edit]

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